This paper argues that current account statistics may provide a poor indication for the real evolution of a country's net foreign assets. This may be due to a series of factors including the mismeasurement of FDI, unreported trade of insurance or liquidity services and debt relief. Because of...

This paper considers ongoing and proposed reforms of the international financial system in light of Latin America's recent experience of volatility and a regional recession largely resulting from financial contagion. The authors begin by surveying three diagnoses of Latin America's financial...

This paper discusses a variety of proposals intended to reform global financial architecture and reduce vulnerability. The authors examine Theories of Too Much, which associate volatility with moral hazard and excessive lending, and Theories of Too Little, which alternatively assert that capital...

This paper uses the 2010/11 Income and Expenditure Survey for South Africa to analyze the progressivity of the main tax and social spending programs and quantify their impact on poverty and inequality. The paper also assesses the redistributive effectiveness of fiscal interventions given the...

The impact on demand for a gambling product of the introduction of a competing product is a topical issue in Britain, Ireland and elsewhere. We consider empirically the demand for Lotto itself and for fixed-odds betting on Lotto draw. The evidence suggests that these products are complements....

Economic theory proposes that consumers are primarily concerned with increasing the mean and reducing the variance of the payoff when choosing between products the return to which is uncertain. This approach fails to explain the popularity of Lotto and other forms of gambling. The highly skewed...